COMMENTARY

Understanding the single term proposal

Kingsley Omose

Nigerian President, Goodluck Jonathan

The proposal by President Jonathan Goodluck for presidents and governors to serve a single term of 6 years as opposed to being eligible for two terms of 4 years each is still generating a lot of uproar notwithstanding that a Bill to that effect is yet to be forwarded for consideration by the National Assembly and the Houses of Assemblies of 36 States.

 Most critics view the proposal with suspicion and have jumped to the conclusion that it is a tenure elongation bid by President Jonathan to add 2 additional years to his 4 year tenure, forgetting that he has emphatically declared that as a serving president he and other governors will be excluded from benefitting from the proposal.

Lawyers will also tell these critics that it is legally impossible to extend the tenure of an elected official by adding more years to the initial term because that would make the amendment to the enabling law, in this case the Nigeria Constitution, retrospective or retroactive, and a basis for mounting a successful legal challenge and upturning such an amendment.

Others have also described the move to amend the tenure of the president and governors at this early stage of President Jonathan's first term as a misplacement of priorities in the light of the monumental developmental challenges facing the nation and the mounting insecurity in Nigeria especially in the North East geopolitical zone.

My response to such critics is that they must be from outer space as they cannot fail to acknowledge that the events surrounding the leadership vacuum and the death of Umaru Yar'Adua, the ascension of Jonathan Goodluck first as acting president and then as substantive president do have a bearing on the insecurity in parts of Nigeria.

The sole basis for the resistance mounted against President Jonathan becoming president was that it was not the turn of a Nigerian from the south to become president under the zoning of power arrangement adopted by the political class, and it is public knowledge that the April 16Presidential Elections was contested on this basis.

The mayhem in about 8 states in the northern part of Nigeria that followed before and after President Jonathan was declared winner of the elections by the Independent Electoral Commission was also directly linked to this perception that the North was being cheated of the opportunity to complete its turn at the helm of political affairs in Nigeria.

I dare say that even the bombing activities of Boko Haram in Borno and Bauchi States and also in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory and the timing of the decision to enthrone Non-interest banking at this critical phase of Nigeria's development is not unconnected with this perceived injustice that is allowing some to go for broke.

In an environment of heightened insecurity characterized by the bombing activities of Boko Haram, the high handed responses of the security agencies to Boko Haram especially in Maiduguri, Borno State, and the increasing tensions associated with the planned introduction of non-interest banking, focused development becomes difficult.

So let's stop pretending that uncertainty regarding whether or not President Jonathan will be standing for re-election come 2015 is not majorly responsible for the heightened insecurity we are presently experiencing in the North East of Nigeria, which has propelled our dear country up the rankings of nations that are plagued by terrorist activities.

The first priority of any good president should be to douse the tensions associated with what happens leading to 2015 that is responsible for the turbulence we are currently experiencing in the polity with the potential of ensuring that we arrive in 2015 so traumatized and brutalized by crises that our democratic experience gets truncated.

It is within this context that President Jonathan's proposal for a president to serve a single term of 6 years has to be considered as an offer to lay to rest the agitations associated with which zone between the North and the South, and who between the South East on the one hand and the three geo-political zones in the North gets to produce

the next President.

This does not mean that I endorse rotation or zoning of power between the North and the South of Nigeria, or a rotation of political power among the six geo-political zones, although I do find it curious that even the Action Congress of Nigeria in deciding to field Nuhu Ribadu as it's presidential candidate in the last elections was informally adhering to the zoning arrangement.

There is merit in the argument that a single six year term for the president and governors will reduce the overbearing influence that the incumbency factor plays in ensuring the re-election of a sitting president or governor, especially in the use of state resources to the disadvantage of their opponents.

Those who think along these lines will readily point to the semblance of order that has been injected into the process of appointment of vice chancellors of Federal Universities following the decision in 1993 to scrap the two term of 4 years each and to replace it with a single 5 year term and the fact that both South Korea and Philippines also operate such a system.

Likewise, there is merit in the counter argument that allowing a president or governor to rule for a single six year term will be a license to loot for the corrupt one's with assurance of immunity from prosecution, while allowing an incompetent president or governor six years in power will be to the detriment of the electorate.

What is important is appreciating that the proposal has pros and cons and merits consideration by the National Assembly and the Houses of Assemblies of the 36 States of the Federation, with inputs from other interest groups thus allowing for a deepening of our democracy and the sheating of all swords and bombs.